


TO BUILD A HOME OUT OF SMOKE AND MIRRORS

by oikawafflehouse



Category: Great Pretender (Anime)
Genre: Alcohol, Drinking, M/M, Overthinking, Shakespeare Quotations, Soft feelings, author fixates on hands, they’re in love your honor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:21:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26481088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oikawafflehouse/pseuds/oikawafflehouse
Summary: When you take matters into your own hands, the world becomes a little less lonely.
Relationships: Edamura Makoto/Laurent Thierry
Comments: 30
Kudos: 142





	TO BUILD A HOME OUT OF SMOKE AND MIRRORS

**Author's Note:**

> [it's the strangest feeling.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c-kZSpzq8HM&ab_channel=PerfumeGenius)

_If we are true to ourselves, we can not be false to anyone._

When it comes to methods of communication, Laurent Thierry seems to come with only two options:

1) A French-speaking fever dream on wheels. 

2) An actor with his head on backwards reciting Shakespeare in the park where everyone ends up either dead or naked by the end of the play. 

Neither option is great. The things that Laurent Theirry chooses to say overall aren’t that great. The things that are then said about him in turn, usually accompanied with a snap of the fingers and a gun pointed his way, aren’t that great. Makato’s chances of making it past the age of twenty-six aren’t that great. 

It’s a whole load of _what-ifs_ and crushed perennials underfoot, and tonight is no different. Tonight, it is cherry-flavored nonsense and gin and tonic without the gin, and Makoto can’t really do much about it, because that’s what happens when you make friends and friends who become more than that: their truths become your truth. Their weight becomes your weight. 

Makoto’s never really had friends before. It’s nice. Kind of. 

“ _We_ are like magicians,” Laurent is beginning to say, signalling the rise of an invisible curtain. His face is as flushed as the rosé that’s been flowing freely all evening from where they sit gathered on the beach, riding the high from the completion of yet another job. Overhead, the clouds are dripping in saturated color as fireworks shoot across the sky, bursting like overripe fruit. Makoto’s diving in and out of shades of orange and pink, lost in thought, until Laurent grabs him by the ankles and abruptly yanks him back down to Earth again.

Used to Laurent’s dramatic declarations, Cynthia simply tells him, “No, I don’t think we are,” before taking a questionably large sip of wine, swaying in her spot in the sand. Makoto feels like he’s swaying, too, even though he hasn’t been drinking (maybe just a little), but that could just be what happens when one is young and invincible, untouched by god and the laws of this land (correction: okay, a lot. He’s been drinking a lot). 

“You’re full of shit,” Abby cheerfully informs Laurent, though not unkindly, before flipping him off and disappearing underneath the folds of her towel with her phone. 

This causes Makoto to snort out loud with all the grace of someone who also is very full of shit. A mistake, because Laurent is now looking at him and whenever Laurent looks at him, he suddenly forgets all of the rules to Hide-and-Seek.

 _Hide_ , his heart screams at him as it bears its tiny fists up against the walls of his ribs in frustration.

 _Seek_ , his brain whispers in response, nothing more than a gentle thrum against his skull. Then: _hm, alcohol. Nice._

“Edamame! What about you?” 

_What about me? Uh, well-_

Makoto glances over to where Laurent sits across from him with a beaming smile. He idly thinks that there must be some kind of Laurent-sized hole in the sky. An intangible man cut from the cloth of the sky torn from the hands of god. He’ll return to his spot among the fabled stars one day and soon there won’t be anyone who’ll look at Makoto like that. No more trips to Paris or renditions of _The Taming of the Shrew_. No more tricks to pull out from the sleeves of his suit or illusions of grandeur. No more lingering questions and stares. 

Twenty-six years yet not lived flash before Makoto’s eyes. It would be a quiet life, at least. 

It’s this fleeting, wine-soaked thought that causes Makoto to say carefully as he can in English, “I also think you’re full of shit.” 

_Phew_ , his heart says, full of relief. _That was a close one_. 

_The fuck was that_ , his brain screams. _Also, alcohol. Have I mentioned how much I love alcohol._

Laurent makes a strange face. Makoto makes a strange face right back at him. He doesn’t want to say what he’s really thinking about because he’s never been that strong, never the person to bear his skin without expecting the piercing sting of an arrow in return. He’s scared of his own shadow, of his own reflection in the mirror, and so his deflection becomes a seat belt on a burning bus doing wheelies on the freeway. _Don't try this at home, kids._

He’s not exactly sure what Laurent expects from him most of the time, but he thinks he'd like to learn one day when he isn't as scared of that hole in the sky. He imagines it would go a lot like this: Laurent says jump and he’ll jump; Laurent says fall and he’ll fall. Laurent doesn’t say anything and Makoto will crumple up like a forgotten bank note because sometimes nothing at all is worse than the truth they each carry with their slender fingers. 

Hide-and-Seek. He’d make a terrible, _terrible_ magician. 

Disappointed, Laurent sighs and turns away. “You all have no imagination,” he says with a sniff, and eventually, the conversation trickles away into something just as meaningless. Something about socks. 

Above them, the entire sky waits, holding its breath. 

:: 

_WHAT EDAMURA MAKOTO DOES NOT SAY ON THAT FATELESS NIGHT:_

_No. We are not magicians. We are more than that. Magicians are there to surprise and to amaze but we are here to carve out a whole fucking home for ourselves in the minds of our targets, to make them really believe in us because if we didn’t, I don’t think we’d have anywhere else to go._ I _wouldn’t have anywhere else to go, and it’s because of this. All of this. You._

 _People look at us with their rings-of-Saturn eyes and they think of us_ _as that speak-easy door, swinging open and close at the drop of a syllable_. _An_ us _and a_ them. _They see the eclipse of a tilted chin and the white doves across the backdrop of a midnight sky and the flowers growing from our wrists. They'll want to know:_ how _. They want to smash all of their telescopes and dig their teeth right into the meat of their secrets, even though I’m pretty sure it would go straight over their heads anyways like the frisbees being thrown at the Parc de la Villette on a sunny day._

 _It’s simple_ , they want to be able to say with that knowing look. _Just follow the magician’s hands._

_Sometimes, all I’m left with are my hands, and I know it’s not that simple. It never is. Not with you. Not with any of you._

_The schemes and heists we pull out of our asses every week are borderline miracles, not just a slight of hand or a flimsy house of cards._ _It’s turning straw into gold, taking matters into our own hands just because we can, because no one has been able to stop us. We are quite literally pulling dust bunnies out of velvet top hats, and it’s great._

_All of you are really great._

::

The next day, Laurent is still talking about magicians. 

“It’s just that we’re con artists,” he says at the table during breakfast, using his fork to repeatedly stab the air. “We put on a show! A different illusion, _every single day_. The greatest magic trick of all. We’re basically magicians, _oui?_ ”

“This again?” Cynthia asks irritably from where she’s lying on the couch nearby with a blanket pulled over her head. “Where’s your hangover?” Makoto had been wondering the same thing, but he’d been too busy staring down his untouched plate of pancakes and contemplating stabbing his eye out with his own fork to ask. Abby had wisely chosen to stay in bed, and everyone else had already taken off for the day, already eager to empty their wallets and to fill up the capitalistic black hole in their hearts. 

“ _Pardon_?” 

“Your. Hangover.”

“I don’t think I get-”

“Oh, shut up.” 

Cynthia pulls herself up from the couch with a groan and quickly scans the room before realizing the only two people left for her to terrorize are Laurent and Makoto, which ultimately just means Makoto because Laurent has a casino chip for a heart and is therefore immune to Cynthia’s antics. Makoto imagines he’ll do quite well for himself up there in the sky. 

“Edamame! Blink if you’re normal!”

He blinks. “I am never drinking again.” 

Cynthia frowns. “That’s what you said last time. After the job in Shanghai. Remember?”

 _No_. “Well.” Underneath the table, Laurent accidentally brushes his foot up against Makoto’s shin, and he resists the urge to scream. “Well. This time I mean it.” 

“Uh-huh.” 

“No, really! I-” 

“Your optimism is truly inspiring, Edamame.”

 _I think I really do mean it this time_ , Makoto thinks to himself much later after Cynthia has left and he’s stuck in the kitchen doing dishes while Laurent watches him do dishes in comfortable silence like always. _No more drinking_. _Except for my birthday. And bank holidays._

It’s a nice thought, one that belongs with his spontaneous desire to learn how to sail and his innate ability to self-destruct at any given moment in time. It must be written all over his face, too, because suddenly Laurent’s folding the distance between them more neatly than he ever does with the laundry. He stands next to Makoto at the sink with his arms crossed over his chest, still not helping with the dishes. He stares outside through the open window straight-ahead. Makoto stares at Laurent’s hands. A shape of a year-old memory follows him all the way here from Los Angeles. 

Even if they are just con artists in the end, there would be nothing more intimate than knowing how the cogs and gears of an illusionist's hands work, he decides. In between them, there are galaxies growing and stars collapsing, but there are also the quiet signals from the Chinese satellites flying overhead and messages from the aliens, too, written in code. 

Blink, and you’ll miss it. Blink, and you won’t understand. Blink, and suddenly you’re both standing in the kitchen, stepping into this routine like it happens every single day instead of once or twice a month. 

The days stretch on, but he's close now.

Laurent somehow _looks_ even closer this morning, too, without the haze of alcohol to smudge his features. Makoto considers him carefully and tries to find through the dull edges of his headache the picture of the man he’d conjured up last night. Man cut from the cloth of the sky becomes man in the kitchen who makes Makoto’s knees go weak. God is nowhere to be found. 

“What's the deal with magicians?” Makoto suddenly asks, dropping his rag into the sink as he turns to face Laurent once more. 

“We saw one performing in the street a few days ago,” Laurent says, not looking away from the window. “When we were in Berlin. You'd stopped to give him a euro. Had me thinking.”

“Oh.” He'd almost forgotten about that. He had not been expecting Laurent to be so forthright, either. They usually dance right around this part. He’s not sure what comes next. 

Maybe Laurent’s onto something after all. 

He doesn’t think of himself as a magician. Not really. Actually, up until recently, he never really thought about himself that much to even consider what he could possibly be beyond _son_ and _con-man_. The word doesn't seem to quite fit him: a product of mis-laid plans and doors revolving at the speed of light. And there’s also the fact that Makoto refuses to be lumped in the same category as Laurent on principle, but, well, shit happens. Laurent happens, and the trajectory of his life can suddenly be held in the palms of someone else, someone who thinks of him often. 

The definition, he supposes, changes from person, just like the definition of what makes a magician a con artist and a con artist a criminal. Just like the meaning of what makes a friend and then when it becomes something more than that. 

It could be that convoluted metaphor on distant shores that no one in English class ever seems to understand, not even the teacher who isn’t being paid enough to deal with all of these terrible high school students and their terrible dick jokes at oh-fuck o’clock in the morning. Or maybe it’s that dream that floats to the top of the circus tent, waiting to be punctured by the thundering applause of the audience. It could be just as simple as seeing a street performer in the streets of Berlin.

It could be all of this and the kind of heaven Laurent came from, too, but Makoto still can’t quite place himself or any of them into that narrative, so he creates his own. 

Con artist meets con artist. The definition of ‘friend’ is torn out from the dictionary and placed in the blender. Los Angeles becomes a place of apocalyptic memories and smiles and kisses. Makoto exists. Laurent confuses the hell out of Makoto just by existing. Life goes on, marked by hangovers and purple-pink skies and conversations about absolutely everything and nothing, all until Makoto reaches the age of twenty-six.

It’s the same story, over and over again. The definition of ‘magician’ becomes nothing but background noise. Hide-and-Seek becomes another game to re-learn. Just change the city and these bare bones will never be laid to rest, just like how Makoto will never again be able to find someone else he can say this about: 

His truth becomes your truth. His weight becomes your weight.

Somehow, it seems less terrifying to behold this early in the morning. No shadows here. No splintered glass or the usual theatrics. Something to make a home out of. It's nice. Kind of. 

And this is what comes next for you: you throw that arrow back into the sky and bare your pale wrists instead. When his hand absent-mindedly reaches for you, you do not shy away, and your heart does not beg for you to hide. Your brain flickers on-and-off like a streetlamp in a back-lit alleyway, because when has something like this ever made sense? 

You find it in yourself the courage to not let go for once. The weight of his hand becomes familiar, and yours alone. God is nowhere to be found and so the sky exhales, breathing the air of the distant cities that brought you two together back into your lungs. 

And what a beautiful truth it is to behold. 

:: 

_WHAT EDAMURA MAKOTO DOES NOT NEED TO SAY OUT LOUD BECAUSE HE IS A TERRIBLE MAGICIAN:_

_Nothing, because we've built this home of smoke and mirrors together._

:: 

_I do love nothing in the world so well as you - is not that strange?_

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me on [twitter.](https://twitter.com/oikawafflehouse)
> 
> 1\. man, laurent really is a menace to society, huh?
> 
> 2\. anyways, the song i linked above is 'without you' by perfume genius. highly recommend. i also would recommend listening to 'the great pretender' by freddie mercury. just because. actually, just any queen song in general. 
> 
> 3\. the beginning quotation comes from the shakespeare play 'hamlet', and the ending quotation comes from another play of his called 'much ado about nothing.' as far as fics goes, this one isn't that dramatic, but one day, i think, i will go full 'if we were villains' and overuse the heck out of shakespeare allusions. it'll be fun. 
> 
> 4\. makoto and laurent are two very interesting characters to me, and i don't think this will be the last time i write about them ahahaha makoto character study perhaps. season 2 when?? 
> 
> 5\. as always, kudos really butter my biscuits but comments are all that and a jug of maple syrup, but do as you please! feel free to bombard me on twitter with great pretender stuff - i don't think i terrorize my followers enough and that is a pity.


End file.
